OIL's benefits have not been limited to its employees alone but it has immensely contributed to the growth of Assam, he said during the 60th anniversary celebration of OIL at South Bank oil well at Naharkatia in Dibrugarh district.

State-owned upstream companies Oil and Natrual Gas Corproation (ONGC) and Oil India Ltd (OIL) may have to bear the shortfall in subsidy as per the present under-recovery mechanism, according to credit rating agency ICRA and equity research firm Kotak Institutional Equity.

State-owned ONGC has torn into regulator DGH's proposal for auctioning its discovered oil and gas fields, saying national oil companies can raise production if they are offered the same fiscal concessions as being extended to private companies.

Selling just 18 per cent out of the government's 68.07 per cent shareholding in Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) will fetch over Rs 41,000 crore at current market price, many times more than the investment commitment it may get from giving away 60 per cent in 11 identified oil and gas fields of the company, they said.

"One offer has come from ADNOC of UAE. They are offering some stake in a field. It is a producing oil field. We are now doing some due diligence now whether it is worth investing or not," OIL CMD Utpal Bora said.